A Long Overdue Update!

Wow, I just checked the blog and realized it has been nearly two weeks since my last entry! SO much has happened since then; too much, in fact, for me to write about in just one entry. In order to keep my thoughts organized, I will first list the things want to blog about and then start writing; whatever is left over after today's entry I will work on tomorrow!
1. AAA adventure
2. Office of Education Strategic Planning Retreat (09/22-25/09)
3. National Book Festival (Saturday, 09/26/09)
4. Congressional Process Orientation (Monday, 09/28/09)
5. Library of Congress (Tuesday, 09/29/09)
6. Heading to Orlando!
7. Upcoming events (work)
Here goes!
So, who knew that you have to start your car every few days and drive it around for awhile so you don't kill the battery? Not me, at least not until its untimely death! Long story (relatively) short: car was dead, and after ascertaining it was likely the battery, I called AAA (which I have had for several years and never used except for trip-planning, which frankly I wasn't doing much of while teaching). Half an hour later, guy shows up, jumps the battery, and tells me to drive for at least a half hour to recharge it. I follow his directions - at rush-hour on a Friday evening, it takes at least that long to get to anywhere I need to drive to (in this case, the grocery store) - get what I need, and get back into the car. And it is dead. Again. Did I mention I had just had it jumped less than an hour ago?
Call #2 to AAA. After telling them not to send their guy to my apartment - since I am now stranded in the parking lot of Staples - and waiting for them to show up, AAA guy #2 shows up. Thankfully, the person they dispatched this time comes in their "Mobile Repair Vehicle"; he checks the battery (and a bunch of other systems, to make sure it's just the battery) and tells me I need a new battery because this one is dead and will not hold a charge. Which I kind of suspected and was anticipating: I looked up AAA's mobile battery replacement earlier in the day to figure out what the damage might be to my wallet. He installs the battery, rechecks the systems, and tells me that I need to move the car at least once a week because even a car at rest loses power from the battery. So now, instead of just being happy that I can walk to work and very rarely have to use the car, I have to make a conscious effort to remind myself to go check on it. Go figure!

On to the retreat. On Tuesday, 09/22, the entire Office of Education (30 of us, from upper management to the newbies like me) travelled to Hampton, Virginia for our annual Strategic Planning Retreat. Suffice it to say, most of the professional development I have been to in the past was NOT at such an awesome location! Our hotel was right on Chesapeake Bay; thanks to government rate, we paid very little (comparatively) for rooms overlooking the water. The hotel was AMAZING - in addition to the "normal" hotel bathroom accoutrements, there was a little bag of goodies on the bed which included such treats as an eye mask, ear plugs, and lavender linen spray (FYI: lavender is an aromatherapeutic sleep aid). Too fun!
After a quick 1:30 conference call (from the lobby - we're still gearing up for Orlando), we were shuttled to Langley Research Center, one of the 10 NASA centers in the U.S. We were immediately scooted into a windowless (grrrr) conference room, where we commenced with our "strategic planning"/retreat activities until 5:30. Then it was off to a wonderful seafood restaurant on the intercoastal waterway for dinner and drinks (then back to the hotel for bed, as we stayed at the restaurant forever).
Day two. At Langley from 8:30 - 5:30. Interesting, but absolutely exhausting being cooped up in one place for that long! After lunch, I gave a presentation called "A Day in the Life of a Teacher", which was basically an hour-to-hour walk through a "normal" school day at LHS. Everyone was SO receptive to what I had to say; I entertained a number of questions before we were finally stopped by the guy running our retreat so we could move on to the next topic. It was such a cool experience to have the attention of such an amazing group of people, and very humbling to get a standing ovation at the end! Dinner was at another seafood restaurant (after an hour or so in the bar to celebrate 2 of our staffer's birthdays) - another LATE night!
Day three. More "retreating", plus a really cool tour of one of their HUGE wind tunnels. They do a lot of aeronautics/aerospace research there (hence Langley RESEARCH Center) - in the 14' wide, 22' tall, 50' long tunnel we were shown (we actually got to go into the tunnel), they were preparing to test a model of the rocket NASA is launching in late October. Dinner was at an AMAZING (seriously - it was the best food I have ever eaten, hands-down) little upscale restaurant near the hotel - thank the Lord for meal reimbursements! - then several of us had some drinks in my sponsor's room. Day four was a half-day, then we returned to DC (I had a conference call in the car on the way home; we were laughing about "Carla and Kristen's conference call from the car" - say THAT 10 times fast!)

Last Saturday - Mom's birthday - I went to the National Book Festival (sponsored by the Library of Congress) on the National Mall. A total of 130,000 people attended the event; it was wall-to-wall (or rather, huge tent to huge tent, as there are no "walls" on the Mall) visitors, authors, and BOOKS! I managed to make it through the line to get an autograph from one of my favorite authors (Nicholas Sparks; as usual, I was boo-hooing at the end!) then headed home to read. What a neat idea!

Yesterday, we (all the Fellows) had Congressional Process Orientation in Arlington. We learned about the history of education policy (fascinating... seriously) and how to communicate with members of Congress, then got our official Einstein Fellow letters to deliver to our state senators/representatives. Since we were all going to be on Capitol Hill today anyway, we decided to wait to deliver our letters (rather than running across town and then having to go back the next day anyway) and went out to lunch. It would have been a really awesome day (and still was, in the context of the fellowship itself) if I hadn't gotten rotten news from the prosecutor in the Little Rock case; needless to say, I am VERY glad I am here and not back in Arkansas, as I have some things I would LOVE to say to some of the people involved in the case,,,

Today was Library of Congress day (actually, one of two days, as we have such a large group of fellows this year that they had to split us into 2 groups). We took a brief (but AMAZING - I was rendered speechless, and y'all know how infrequently that happens!) tour of the Jefferson Building (the main part of the LoC) and then went through the tunnels to the Madison Building for orientation to using the Library. Frankly, that part got more than a little boring - I would rather have spent more time touring than sitting in a conference room. We ate lunch, got our library cards, then headed to the various senate and house office buildings to deliver our letters. Such a neat experience to walk around Capitol Hill all "suited up"; I really kind of felt (and looked) like I was supposed to be there!

Whew, got through 5 topics tonight! Will write about numbers 6 and 7 tomorrow - exciting times ahead!

R.I.P. 1st Lieutenant Tyler Parten

I was going to update my blog today (been a long time... flu) with all of the exciting adventures that come with working at NASA. However, while looking for an address online, I found out that one of my former students was killed in Afghanistan last Thursday. He was 24 years old and was laid to rest today in Marianna.

Not really feeling like updating the blog.

RIP, Tyler, and God bless your family and all who love you.

Meetings and Memos and Traffic - Oh My!!!

So, I'm getting a new badge tomorrow. Apparantly they've decided to reclassify me; I have to turn in the badge I got yesterday, go through ANOTHER identification check (which I couldn't do today because you have to have two government-issued forms of ID and I don't carry my passport with me); I'll stand on my hand if it means I'll get my work laptop soon!
Today was meetings most of the day, then reading to prepare for other meetings and projects I will be working on. After work, I decided to make a "quick" run for mice, which ended up being not-so-quick because President Obama is speaking at the Capital tonight and traffic was awful (and then I couldn't get down the street I normally take to get home because it was blocked off by the police, so I had to use the GPS, which took its time finding a satellite, so I got a little lost.
Have you seen the images from Hubble that NASA released today? They are STUNNING - I downloaded the picture you see above to use as the background on my laptop; it looks like a butterfly, but it's actually an exploding star! In other awesome NASA-related news, I may get to do something really cool on Friday for National Day of Remembrance; I'll write more about it when I find out if I am allowed to (confidential information?) or after I attend, whichever happens first!
This is the life!!!

I'm Official!

I got my ID badge today; yay for no more having to go through security check every morning!
Today was mostly meetings, but got off to a great start with a preview (for NASA people) of part of the new movie Imax and NASA are putting out next March. Cool beans!

I Will Definitely Not Starve In DC!

Wow. That's all I can say about today.
Nothing super-exciting in terms of visiting a museum or monument (or any other such DC adventure), but a really great day nonetheless. Anthonette and I both needed household stuff (badly), so we headed out with my trusty GPS. After a VERY circuitous ride - we figured out on the way back to DC there was a MUCH easier way we could've gotten where we wanted to go - we had a great time shopping (again, it was just household stuff, but everything's more fun with a friend). We made our way back into DC late in the day - and just in time for the TORRENTIAL downpour to begin - and headed to Momiji, her favorite DC sushi spot. The food was AMAZING - quite possibly the best sushi I have EVER had - and the ambiance was great; we had a blast watching a group at the hibachi (and got a laugh out of me getting whacked in the shoulder by a flying piece of cucumber when the guy at the grill was trying to get someone in the group to catch it in his mouth... he missed) and enjoyed a shared order of mochi, which is a wonderful ice cream-like dish.
The title of today's blog refers to the fact that I did not eat a single item of home-cooked food (morning coffee doesn't count) today. I had last night's leftover salad and pizza for breakfast (it was calling to me from the fridge!), a burger and fries at Five Guys (a chain that receives RAVE reviews by just about every reviewer every year) for lunch, and the sushi for dinner. Funny thing is, I'm doing so much walking that I've actually DROPPED a size since moving here! Imagine what I could do if I started eating at home more - but who can refuse lunch out with colleagues or dinner with friends?

A Lovely Saturday in DC

Went on my first "date" in DC today. Was a set-up (of sorts) by a friend from high school is friends with the guy; we met for lunch (Indian) and a tour of Eastern Market. Nice guy, good time.
Anthonette and I went for very late dinner/drink at a neat little place called Matchbox in the Eastern Market area. Nice place; had a lovely crab and avocado salad and split a small pizza (sausage and sun-dried tomatoes - yum). Fun to be able to go out and socialize with people in my age range!

A Wonderful First Week!

I realize I skipped a day (blogging) yesterday - I was EXHAUSTED when I got home from "work"!

Still no computer; not finished being investigated for my security clearance. Have an appointment Tuesday, though, so wish me luck! No computer means no official e-mail, which means no business cards (since my e-mail address needs to be on them). I DID get my name on my cubicle door, though! Worked on a couple of proposals the past few days; it is very strange to now have a job where I can't get into detail about what I'm doing!

Other things I have observed (or been told):
1. They clean the bathrooms a LOT! Which is a good thing, coming from a job where you were lucky if you could find toilet paper!
2. If you don't take your stuff out of the fridge in the "galley" (microwave, vending machine, etc.) by 3:00 PM on Fridays, they will throw it away. Which, considering the experiments that grew in the fridge in the teachers' lounge in Marianna, is probably a good thing!
3. There is a problem with mice at NASA. I was told never to leave anything edible out or the mice would take over my cube. Again, something I'm used to, but it's NASA!
4. Going through security without having a badge is a pain! Not used to armed people at work (although I probably would have been surprised by the number of students who were...) x-raying my stuff. Or having to go through a metal detector every time I enter the building.
5. Some things (not clearance, apparently) get done VERY fast when you ask. "I don't have a garbage can" - poof, one appears in my cubicle. "There's a big post in the way of opening one of my cabinet doors" - poof, someone comes and takes the door off. Not used to efficiency!
6. Personal observation: be careful opening/closing the sliding door on your cubicle. If you are not, it WILL come off the track and you will look like a dingbat (and lose a fingernail right before you were going for a manicure) trying to wrestle it back on!
7. Personal observation #2: when you work in a place with cubicles, you can hear EVERYTHING that is going on in the office. When someone sneezes, numerous voices shout "bless you" from their cubes. I find this funny! On the un-funny side of things, you can hear EVERYTHING that is going on, which is kind of distracting (people talking on the phone, having "private" conversations, etc. I am going to get some headphones (and eventually an i-pod) to tune people out.

Federal employee = 3-day weekend! I have a feeling it's going to be a good one!